By Kristen M. Blankley

Despite the growing practice over the last three decades, mystery and misconception still swirl around the collaborative law (CL) practice. At its core, CL is a negotiation-only practice that allows the parties and their lawyers to put all of their attention into resolving a dispute collaboratively, openly, and without resort to legal processes – such as court pleadings and formal discovery. To accomplish this goal, CL utilizes a disqualification agreement under which the “parties agree in advance that their lawyers are disqualified from further representing parties by appearing before a tribunal if the collaborative law process ends without complete agreement.” Read more